It's time for new owners
By Henry Lamb
web posted July 1, 2002
It's too late to ask why the west is burning, everyone already
knows it is the result of absurd environmental policies that have
prevented logging to thin the fuel; the "roadless" policy that
prevents firefighters from having access to the forests; and the
Endangered Species Act, that won't allow heavy equipment in
critical habitat to cut firebreaks.
When volunteers brought their own equipment to help fight the
Colorado fire, Kim Martin, the Incident Commander for the
Forest Service, told the volunteers, "The equipment is too heavy.
It will tear up the land." The volunteers could do nothing but
watch the forests burn.
Every environmental organization that has sued, or lobbied to
prevent logging, and to close forest roads, should be required to
man the front lines against every wildfire that burns.
A thick clowd of smoke rises from the raging wildfire near
Forest Lakes, Ariz. on June 26
The smoke rising from West of the Mississippi raises another,
bigger question: why does the federal government own most of
the land in the West in the first place?
America was built on the principle of free enterprise, which
begins with private ownership of land and resources. Nearly half
of America is now owned by the government - federal, state,
and local. How can free enterprise exist if government owns the
land and resources?
Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution sets forth clearly the
purposes for which the federal government may purchase land
"...with the consent of the Legislature" of the state in which the
land is located, "for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals,
dock-yards, and other needful buildings;"
There's not a word in the Constitution about the 400,000
scorched acres in Arizona, or the 200,000 acres wasted in
Colorado, or the two million acres that have burned this year.
Why does the federal government own it?
Until early in the 20th century, the land owned by the federal
government was the object of divestiture. The prevailing view
was to acquire land for U.S. citizens, but to get it into private
hands as quickly as possible. That's why we had a Homestead
Act that encouraged people to move west.
Green groups, notably, the Wilderness Society, caught up in
fashionable socialism, agitated for the nationalization of all
forests, and continued pressing government to end the land give-
away, and finally, to lock up all the land that remained in the
federal estate. Why?
Years ago, the reason given was to ensure that U.S. citizens
would have the wood, minerals, and other resources needed by
a growing nation. No more. Green groups have all but stopped
logging, mining, and even grazing on federal land. Wilderness and
Monument designations have locked out humans from hundreds
of millions of acres of this so-called public land.
Now, the fashionable excuse for federal ownership is "to protect
biodiversity." The biodiversity in Arizona and Colorado, and the
rest of the West, can not afford to be protected by the feds.
There is no legitimate reason for the federal government to own a
third of all the land in the United States. If it is right and good for
the feds to own 83 percent of Nevada, why, then, should the
feds not own 83 percent of New York, or Pennsylvania? It
makes no sense. States can manage their own land better than
the feds. Private owners can manage their land better than any
government.
Divestiture of the federal estate is not a new idea. Many fine
politicians have met their doom by trying to promote this idea.
Politicians, though, tend to sway in the breeze of public opinion.
In the last half of the 20th century, hot air emissions from green
extremists have increasingly kept the political tiller turned toward
the absurd.
Looking at the charred ruin of wasted forests and roasted
wildlife, to say nothing of the ashes of hundreds of homes, it's
time to step back and seriously ask, why do we continue to
allow the federal government to hold title to our land?
The federal land in which private citizens have a property right -
either water, grazing, logging, mining, or whatever, should be
offered for sale first, to those individuals. All other federal land,
which does not qualify under Article I, Section 8, should be
relinquished to the state in which the land lies, for disposition by
the state.
The rush to acquire more and more land for "open space,"
should be halted, and reversed. In a free enterprise society, the
market will provide the open space that the people want.
Green pressure groups have been successful in their efforts to
transform America from a free
enterprise society, into the socialist society envisioned by the
Wilderness Society in the 1930s. It's no longer called a socialist
vision, it's now called a vision of sustainability. Call it what you
will. A society in which government owns the sources of
production, and controls the use of private land is not a free
society.
It's time for government to get out of the real estate business.
Henry Lamb is the executive vice president of the Environmental
Conservation Organization, and chairman of Sovereignty
International.
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